Helen J. Wiesner

Helen J. Wiesner of Carroll and formerly of Ames, Iowa, and Horseshoe Bend, Arkansas, died peacefully on November 14, 2014. Funeral services will be held at 11:00 A.M. on Thursday, November 20, 2014 at the Dahn and Woodhouse Funeral Home in Carroll. A reception and time to share memories will follow the service at the funeral home. Burial will be in the Highland Memory Gardens Cemetery in Des Moines. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be directed to the Veterans of Foreign Wars. She was born on December 2, 1917 in Seymour, Missouri. She was the daughter of Charlie and Leola (Douglas) Hawkins. During World War II she worked at the Des Moines ordinance plant and at Younkers. Later she worked in the purchasing department at Iowa State University and ended her working years as an optometrist’s assistant in Ames. Helen married Marvin K. Wiesner on November 30, 1938 in Bethany, Missouri. They had two children, Douglas Warren and Christine Elaine. Helen and Marvin were members of the Presbyterian Church in Des Moines, Ames, and Horseshoe Bend. She loved traveling and visited most of the US states as well as Greece, Spain, and England. Despite her work career, she was primarily a wife and mother, and shared and supported her husband’s hobbies. They both loved music and dancing, and enjoyed entertaining friends. She is survived by her daughter Christine Simmons, her son-in-law Bill Simmons, her daughter-in-law Malinda Wiesner, her two grandsons, Brian Wiesner and his wife Tiffany and Christopher Carlson and his wife Kelly, and her six great grandchildren, Ainsley, Lindley, and Isabel Wiesner, and Dylan, Max, and Jacob Carlson. She was preceded in death by her parents, her sister Geneva Backus, her husband, her son, and her grandson, Kyle Wiesner.